The IRS replaced its left-leaning top spokeswoman who worked at the agency for 27 years but did not announce or explain her removal.
Jodie Reynolds, formerly the chief of communications for the agency who was often quoted in news stories, was previously arrested for driving while intoxicated, according to court documents obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.
The IRS quietly removed Reynolds’ name from an organizational chart after the DCNF reached out on Thursday about her history. The updated chart shows there is a new “acting” chief.
A conservative group that investigated Reynolds’ background said her case showed hypocrisy in the taxation agency tasked with enforcing the law on Americans.
“Jodie Reynolds is a perfect case study of the rot inside the IRS,” American Accountability Foundation (AAF) president Tom Jones told the DCNF. “This is an agency that will hammer working Americans over a paperwork mistake, yet it kept a top official on payroll after she was arrested for drunk driving.”
Reynolds, 50, led an office handling the IRS’ relations with Congress, other government agencies, the news media and other groups, according to the IRS website. She did not respond to multiple requests for comment from the DCNF, and the IRS’ media office did not answer questions about her employment status.
After the DCNF reached out, Reynolds deleted her X and LinkedIn accounts.
Reynolds had posted on LinkedIn in April that she was looking for another job. The IRS told the DCNF on Tuesday that Reynolds still held her chief position — before the DCNF inquired about her criminal record. The agency did not specify when she was removed.
IRS spokesperson Jodie Reynolds in a mug shot at the Henry County Jail in October 2015 in New Castle, Indiana. (Photo courtesy of Henry County)
While working under both Republican and Democratic presidents, Reynolds displayed disapproval of both Trump administrations’ policy moves in her social media postings.
She posted “#familiesbelongtogether” on Twitter in 2018, referencing a social media campaign against so-called family separation that critics say resulted from President Donald Trump’s border policies. She also liked an April LinkedIn post by a lawyer who announced that she had sued to stop Trump from firing her from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the DCNF found.
Reynolds was pulled over and arrested by Knightstown, Indiana police in October 2015 for speeding, nearly veering off the road and “failing to signal lane changes,” the local police department’s affidavit says. The arrest occurred while she was employed as a media relations specialist at the IRS, according to her LinkedIn profile.
Reynolds, who was living in Indiana at the time, told police officers that she had consumed five beers that evening, adding “that she has a government job and that she will lose it if she gets into trouble,” according to the affidavit.
Reynolds remained at the IRS under the Obama administration after having worked there since 1998 — and went on to become a branch chief, acting director and finally, in 2023, rose to become the head of its communications office, a highly visible and influential position.
The affidavit said Reynolds acted in an “abusive” manner toward police during the 2015 encounter and refused to take a chemical test to determine her blood-alcohol content. “She was very argumentative and showed mood swings,” an Indiana state trooper wrote.
In Indiana, refusing a breath test upon request of a law enforcement officer is in itself a crime. One officer said Reynolds refused despite him explaining the law to her.
“I read Indiana Implied Consent to Miss Reynolds,” the officer wrote. “Miss Reynolds said that she will not take anymore tests without a lawyer present. I asked Miss Reynolds if she is refusing to take a chemical test and she said ‘yes I am.’”
Police later obtained a warrant to have Reynolds’ blood drawn at a hospital, revealing she was unlawfully drunk while driving.
The document also said that Reynolds had five other traffic violations going back to the 1990s, four of which were for speeding. She failed to pay the fine for one of the offenses and had her license suspended in 1995.
Reynolds pleaded guilty to operating a vehicle while intoxicated and served one year of probation, though a judge found that she could have also been charged with public intoxication, records show. She initially requested a jury trial to fight her charges, but due to her probation, Reynolds walked away from the 2015 incident with no conviction on her record.
Reynolds asked a court to grant her limited driving privileges less than two months after her arrest, and a judge agreed in December, finding that she did not refuse a chemical test “knowing and willfully.”
“Defendant’s employment with the IRS requires that Defendant sometimes travel to Washington D.C.,” Reynolds’ lawyer wrote in one motion.
“Reynolds could’ve killed someone, and instead of firing her, the IRS handed her a promotion,” the AAF’s Jones told the DCNF. “If that doesn’t tell you everything about the culture of that agency, nothing will.”
The IRS began laying off workers by the dozens in February amid scrutiny from the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Trump’s agency working to shrink government bureaucracy. The IRS reportedly fired almost a third of its tax auditors and about 50 IT executives by March, with DOGE planning to cut its total staff by up to two-thirds.
Reynolds made her left-leaning views public in 2017, by approvingly reposting a video on Twitter by a Black Lives Matter activist. The post declared: “If you’re tired of going to work and making money for other people, then you’re probably tired of capitalism.”
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